


like fire (hellfire)

by goddcoward



Series: i hate you, i love you (i hate that i love you) [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: AUTISTIC TOBIRAMA IS LAW........, Angst with a Happy Ending, Arranged Marriage, Autism Spectrum, Bad Decisions, Developing Relationship, Dysfunctional Family, Emotional Manipulation, Good Intentions, I love him., Loss of Virginity, M/M, MadaTobi Week 2019, Mythology and Folklore, Slow Burn, and it's gonna take a while for them to overcome this, but the choices they make have bad effects, he's. learning how to be a person. and he's very bad at it in the beginning, im allowed to stan one (1) random background man who isn't shit and i choose senju tobirama, madara doesn't know how interpersonal relations work and Holee Shit it shows!, nothing is ever actually done with harmful intentions, so i might go crazy go stupid and tag this as
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-08
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2019-11-12 22:05:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 17,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18019322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goddcoward/pseuds/goddcoward
Summary: Peace with the Uchiha. Hashirama has finally done it, finally succeeded in the impossible; he’s gotten Uchiha Izuna to agree to a ceasefire and further negotiations, and he’s done it without losing a single life.Well. Hashirama managed to do it without killing anyone, but to say he’s lost no lives would be inaccurate.He was so quick to offer up Tobirama, after all, so willing to sell him to the enemy that killed their younger brothers.--in which uchiha madara does not exist, hashirama is buddy-buddy with a fire god, and tobirama is sold to that same kami as a human sacrifice and a joke of a spouse





	1. this fire in my skin

**Author's Note:**

> mm i just feel like posting i think. there arent any excuses i just like sharing my writing lmao........

An enormous, winding plume of ash and steam eclipses the sky, puffy storm clouds of black and silver-gray dissolving into the golden red of the sunset. Along with the path that climbs up to it, Kagutsuchi is almost constantly enveloped in the dense swirl of smoke that pours out of the volcano’s mouth, but tonight is a lucky one – a northerly wind carries the gases up and away from Hashirama, and he can breathe clearly without blessings or chakric intervention.

He’s made this hike a hundred times and can do it in his sleep – if Madara is a reliable source, he already  _has_  – but the hours he has to ruminate in his thoughts are not cheerful ones.

Hashirama is a little more than prone to fantasies than most, a little more detached from reality, but he cannot deny it, not when nothing he says will make Uchiha Izuna listen. Not when he risks losing Tobirama and Tōka and Mito and the others more every day the war continues. Not when he is  _sure_  in his soul that peace is possible, is  _necessary,_  but he lacks the persuasive power he needs to get through to the Uchiha.

 _His_  power isn’t enough, but…

Hashirama hasn’t told anyone – no, that’s not  _exactly_ true, he’s told  _everyone_  – about his kinship with the Uchiha kami that lives in their volcano, but no one really believes him. With that in mind, no one has raised the issue of Madara and his sway over the Uchiha: no one genuinely thinks that he, a Senju, has any kind of relationship with the Uchiha’s patron god, and they wouldn’t dream of considering that he capitalize on their friendship to make peace. Kami don’t give things away, divine endorsements or otherwise, just because it doesn’t hurt them do to so – their blessings must be  _earned,_  and there is genre after genre of legend and parable detailing the nasty, well-deserved fates that befall those proud few who are foolish enough to demand what they have no right to.

Hashirama can’t change that – he has few material possessions, and even as Clan Head, what he does own is not of much commercial value. Objectively, he knows he has nothing to offer, nothing beyond the years of camaraderie he’s shared with Madara, nothing more than their friendship, but—

He has to  _try._  He can’t sit and watch as the world falls apart and his precious people are hurt. He can’t bear to know that Uchiha Izuna’s stubbornness and pride is the only thing he can’t surmount, the  _only thing_  keeping him from peace. 

By the time the black basalt spires of Kagutsuchi are visible, the moon is rising, limning the temple’s silhouette in silver from above. It’s a beautiful complement to the red-orange cast by the lava flows, and a sight Hashirama never tires of.

Normally the beauty of Mt. Shōja – the mountain is simply called  _temple,_  and the legends say the earth created it as a divine hearth intended to house Madara, which is probably bullshit but still nice to think about – takes his breath away, but tonight Hashirama is somber. 

Seated on the black stone steps is Madara, clad in the human-form he wears for their meetings, face impassive and hands steepled under his chin. It’s impossible to tell what he’s thinking when he gets like this, so very different from his usual expressiveness, but Hashirama decides to take it as a good sign – a sign that Madara will seriously consider what he has to say.

Their decades of friendship have obliterated what heavenly accoutrements should probably separate the two of them, and Hashirama jogs lightly up to Kagutsuchi’s gates to the sound of Madara telling him he’s late.

[ **I’ve been waiting, Senju,** ] he says, black eyes glittering. His voice rumbles in his chest like a rockslide, but its grandiosity is completely lost on Hashirama, who softens the unusual tension in the atmosphere by wailing dramatically at the accusation.

“I’ve – I’ve only got two feet, Madara, don’t be mean! Not everyone can just  _teleport_  places, I’m not Tobirama!”

[ **I’m not sure how you don’t _know_  this, but I  _cannot_  teleport places.**]

“And neither can I, so it takes me time to do things like  _climb mountains_  and this one in particular! You can’t even see the Senju compound from here, it’s so far—”

[ **Oh, and here I was, under the impression that your home is not visible because it is purportedly the ancestral territory of a noble Clan of _ninja,_  who, if I remember correctly, are meant to be  _stealthy._ Mortals are so confusing.**]

Hashirama can’t keep a straight face when Madara says that – his expression is so carefully manufactured to be perfectly haughty and untouchable, so unbelievably different from his usual screeching and scowling that he almost rolls over laughing. This earns him the ire of his friend, whose big black mane of hair actually  _puffs up_  in anger. When that happens, it only makes him laugh  _harder_ , because –

“Ahhhh _hhh,_  so  _cuuute,_  you’re like a cat! Heeeere, kitty, kitty-”

[ **Fuck, I _knew_  giving fire to the humans was a mistake. I’m a kind and benevolent overlord, continually declining to wipe you off the face of the earth with lava, and for my generosity I am –  _laughed at!_ Insolent Senju, do you  _want_  your fucking Clan to survive or  _not—_** ]

“— _Oh my god—_ it’s a big angry hedgehog! Ahaha, you look so  _silly,_  Madara, if you want to smite anyone, you’ll have to change skins…! Oh,  _boo,_  you’re no fun! I guess you want me to go ahead and do the whole prostrating myself before your eternal glory and all that and beg you for mercy.  _Hmph!_  It’s awfully hard to take you seriously when you look like Uni rolled in coal dust, you know!”

Madara, who has burnt himself free of his human glamour, scowls fiercely at that, and it does look a great deal more intimidating with all those teeth and the simmering cracks of black spiderwebbing across his skin.

[ **You want me to end the war for you, don’t you.** ]

“Aww, straight to business then. Yes, I do. The Uchiha respect you, they literally  _worship you_ , and Izuna won’t agree to anything since I’m a Senju. I—I know I have nothing to offer but  _please,_  is there—is there anything  _you_  want? Uhh, a new temple? Maybe a haircut?”

Madara stands and crosses his arms over his broad chest, glaring down at Hashirama with his obsidian eyes. He’s displeased, as Hashirama had thought he might be, and it’s  _discouraging_. He never really expected the kindness in the god’s heart to get him the peace for  _free,_  but he’d be lying if he said he hadn’t really,  _really_  hoped that would be the case. 

Worse than Madara’s visible anger is his silence. The pop and crackle of open flame and the distant bubbling of lava seem increasingly menacing to Hashirama as the quiet draws on, and it occurs to him that maybe, just  _maybe,_  bothering a god with no payment prepared qualifies as the kind of hubris that gets people smote.

Hashirama is thankful for the overwhelming, suffocating heat of the temple, close as it is to the caldera – he can blame his effusive sweating on the volcano instead of his own interminable  _idiocy._  

[ **Come back when you have _something,_** ] Madara sighs, turning away from him and tossing his smoky, bristly not-hair behind him as he leaves. [ **Come back with something _good_  and you can have your peace. This is a favor, Hashirama, for  _you_ , because I know  _you’re_ a virtuous person with pure intentions. The same grace will not be extended to anyone else, and it will be revoked if my sacrifice isn’t worth all the trouble.**] 

“Is there anything at all I have access to that you would want? Anything I have some claim to that could convince you?” 

The tall, shadowy figure of the fire god is almost perfectly still – only the wisps of his long hair flicker and twist as they always do, drifting away into the air like black smoke.

[ **What is most precious to you, Hashirama? _Truly_  precious, besides peace? What is it that you fight for, Senju? What do you want to protect so  _badly_  that you are more than willing to risk your life, your Clan’s life,  _my_  Clan’s life to achieve peace?**]

“…”

He can’t answer. There’s no one specific thing that fuels his ambition – he’s always wanted it, has ever since he was a child, and Madara  _knows_  this. He held him and comforted him as he cried, left his stronghold on Mt. Shōja to take the form of a human boy and be there for him, he  _cared._  Hashirama is sure that he still does and holds that truth within his heart. He’s more certain of the strength of Madara’s convictions and the depth of his kindness than he is of the sun rising in the east, and he’s never bothered to hide it.

[ **I will do this thing you ask of me. I will tell Izuna that the peace is necessary. I will personally assure him that the Senju will not hurt he or his, not with me watching them. I will extend my protection and blessings to your village, Hashirama, and in return, I only want to know – what is it, truly, that you do this for? I want you to bring me your _heart,_  Senju, and if you do not surrender it willingly, if you do not understand your own convictions…**]

Hashirama doesn’t think he’s breathing. This is it, he’s  _so close,_ this is his life’s dream, and he’s always said he’ll give up  _anything_  for it – if Madara wants his death, he’ll slice his own throat.

[ **…then I’ll rip your real heart right out of your chest and refuse to acknowledge the Senju. I swear I’ll _kill_  you, Hashirama, and once you’re dead, there will be no  _chance_  of peace. There will never be any village, and you will have  _failed_.**]

Madara looks back at him one last time, his night-black eyes glowing red-hot and the cyclic pinwheel of his Mangekyō hypnotic. Hashirama can hear the pounding of his blood in his ears, can barely breathe for the thickness of the smoke permeating the air, but-

-can he do this? Can he barter away...could he  _do_  that?

"Madara.”

The god stops in his tracks and is frighteningly still, but - he's listening. This is Hashirama's chance.

He has nothing to say, and in a moment Madara vanishes in a burst of light and flame.


	2. this burning desire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> updates will begin regularly on the 20th lmao i just wanted to get this out there........can rest a lil easier w/ the actual start posted

When Hashirama returns to Kagutsuchi three days later, all he brings with him is a single kunai knife. Madara is just about to rip into him for being cheap – they _just_ discussed this, and he’s certain he drove his point home appropriately – when the great dumbass speaks, and what he says infuriates Madara so thoroughly that he nearly incinerates the human right there and then.

“This – this isn’t your offering, Madara, it’s…insurance, I suppose. It’s a precursor; these markings on the handle are Tobirama’s new Hiraishin seal, and…”

He takes a deep breath. Hashirama looks like he might be on the verge of _crying,_ and Madara is almost overcome with a disgusting amount of guilt at having caused him distress, but then he continues. 

“…would…if I offered you Tobirama, if I gave you my _last_ brother, would – would you keep him safe? I know I’m not in a position to make any demands, but he is my most precious person, and I’ll – I’ll give him away to you, but please, _please_ don’t _hurt_ him, Madara. Things are hard enough for him as it is.”

Hashirama – Hashirama is going to _what?_ Madara has to forcibly, physically restrain himself from just leaning over and _smiting_ the bastard, because how _dare_ he. _How dare he_ approach Madara, the kami of fucking _familial love,_ and – and just _barter away_ the very last of his immediate relatives? For a better cause or not, for peace or not, it takes every shred of self-control he possesses, every single iota of discipline he’s gained from his centuries of life, _all_ of his power to keep from _obliterating_ Hashirama off of the face of the fucking earth for having the _gall—_

—No. Madara must remain on top of himself. It is true that he _did_ order Hashirama to part with his dearest thing, and to just kill him now would be…somewhat hypocritical, but still. The knowledge that he would part with his little brother, the individual who Madara _knows_ from many, many hours spent listening to distraught wailing to be Hashirama’s staunchest supporter, the backbone of his administration… The knowledge that he would just _do_ that without fighting further to keep him close and safe burns through him like a wildfire and scrapes painfully against his core.

[ **What if I don’t want him. What if I just take him as a human sacrifice and turn him into ash.** ]

"I – you’ll still give me the peace, right?"

[ ** _Senju…_** ] 

It is very unlike Hashirama, to just relinquish what he loves without trying as hard as he can to keep it, and it makes Madara _angry-angry-angry_ that he would be so callous and cold. This human is the single most caring creature he’s ever had the misfortune of meeting, and that he would just make his way back up to Kagutsuchi and casually offer up one of his own most precious persons is horrifying to consider, and it courses through Madara like the shock of cold water.

The man before him is Hashirama, yes, but a Hashirama who is _determined._ He’s already made his choice, and there is likely nothing that could be done to sway him from his decision. He truly, genuinely believes that Senju Tobirama is, in his heart of hearts, the single thing on earth he loves more than all else, and though it surely must pain him to give that away so easily, he _will._ He’s always been so firmly set in his ways.

Madara isn’t sure that even he could do a single thing to convince Senju otherwise, not when he is so rock-solidly sure in the rightness of his own convictions.

Hashirama is a good man – this is fact. He is kind, compassionate, generous, enthusiastic in a time where those traits are all but extinct, and those things are embedded into the deepest parts of him. Every significant choice that he makes, no matter how difficult, no matter how excruciating, he makes because he is wholly convinced that his path is the right one. If he isn’t, he’ll find a way to delude himself into believing he is, because if Hashirama begins to doubt himself, he’ll _shatter._ He’s blind to his worst faults due to this, and though it’s certain that he regrets losing Tobirama, it’s also certain that he does not blame himself for making it happen. There is no questioning the fact that he will hate being separated from his brother, but there is also no questioning the fact that he is unshakably sure that it was necessary for the continued survival of his Clan and of Hi no Kuni as a whole. 

He is a good man, but he is shockingly lacking in empathy, and there is no questioning the fact that he believes that the village will just be able to _replace_ Tobirama in his heart and his mind. There is no questioning the fact that he must believe that his success will fill the gap in his soul that the loss of his brother will cause, and – worst of all, perhaps he’s _right._ Hashirama has always seen the world differently; it’s what makes him such a good warlord, such a brutal executioner, and many times he’s refused to consider the obvious emotional toll something will have just because it didn’t occur to him in the moment.

Perhaps, thinks Madara as betrayal twists violently inside him, Tobirama really is better off away from this man, who loves him so fiercely and overwhelmingly but is also so quick to cast him aside for the greater good. 

Perhaps Tobirama’s life will be a happier one if he spends it with Madara, who is the manifestation of passion and love and warmth, who is by nature _incapable_ of lying, who burns with hatred at the notion that Hashirama would so easily abandon that which should _never_ be abandoned.

He is the god of fire, and he represents violence and destruction, but it is he and he alone who has mastered the ability to turn that force towards the betterment of life. It is he alone who can wield Amaterasu in her full glory, he alone who can use the heavenly flames to scourge anything of any impurity without harming the whole. 

It is possible that it is he alone who can properly provide for Hashirama’s little brother – if the man himself can’t do it, and he has just repeatedly proven that he _can’t,_ not if he lacks the fierce love one should _always_ hold for family – then perhaps it is better that Madara takes the man to be his own.

Perhaps it is better that Tobirama lives a life free of scum who would not cherish him as humans were _designed_ to cherish their loved ones. 

It’s a violent shock to discover that Hashirama himself is incapable of holding on to that love, but at the same time, it really isn’t – since he was a small child his entire heart has always been dedicated to _peace,_ his entire being working for the Clan and not the individual, his compassion never intended to be saved for any one person.

Madara’s rage is cooled, just a little bit, just enough so that he can reliably keep himself from slapping Hashirama into the mouth of the volcano.

[ **I will take your brother and keep him here. He won't leave - I won't let him, not if he belongs to me, which he _does,_ now, Hashirama. You have offered him and I have accepted and he is no longer  _yours._  I will take Tobirama to be my husband and I will ensure he is kept safe, but in return, in return for the wellbeing of your last brother, in return for your peace, you are never to try and contact him again. When you leave him to me you leave him  _forever_ , Senju. Understand?**]

“I – yes, I understand.” 

When Hashirama leaves that night, Madara sighs and goes into Kagutsuchi proper, staring at the inhospitable interior of his temple and wondering what the hell he’s going to do with a _human._ He’s never taken a bride, never having seen the need to, and he’s never had any kind of partner before – could he really meet Tobirama’s needs? _Will_ he be able to keep him safely protected in the embrace of his arms?

His lack of surety only makes him angrier, and that night Mt. Shōja shimmers as Madara rebuilds his temple so that it may be a true home to him and his husband. No more sleeping in magma, now, since magma is bad for the humans; he’ll have a proper bed, and it’s easy enough to fireproof it with his own powers.

No more blistering temperatures all the time; Tobirama is a Suiton user, and Madara creates for him a glorious altar of his own, a giant fountain wrought out of obsidian and basalt that gleams in a hundred different colors under the light of the moon. It somewhat resembles the mountain, but he still thinks that it’s elegant and unique enough to be a satisfactory gift for his bride, and he can always ask Tobirama himself when he comes. 

No more fire elementals; the humans are fragile and they burn oh so easily, and Madara can’t _entirely_ fireproof his husband, so he breathes the flame of eternal life into a hawk he finds circling the base of his mountain. She is a noble guardian and a suitable protectress, and when he dedicates her being to Tobirama and his wellness, she agrees easily enough to give him her life as Madara has given her some of his own. She is dubbed Suzaku, and when her fiery feathers shine in the light of the rising sun, his work is complete for the now; one last jutsu to clear the air around Kagutsuchi of smog and toxic gas and he is ready for Tobirama, ready to receive his new husband.

Waiting-waiting-waiting is long and arduous for an impatient creature like Madara, and as time passes and the peace comes ever closer, he finds himself and his power nearly bursting with excitement and eagerness. Soon he will have _company,_ a husband of his very own to love and cherish, a being who can complement him without having to be brought into existence by Madara’s own hands. It’s excruciating, letting days just go by as his promised one is _not with him,_ even though he knows that he’ll have Tobirama soon enough, and that it would be cruel to rip him away from everything he’s ever known prematurely, but…

For some reason, Madara can’t help but betray his own values and _thank_ Hashirama for giving up his brother – he’s never been intimate with anyone, has never had that chance, and there is so much leashed love sitting dormant within his heart that sometimes it physically pains him to withhold it.

Soon there will be a _Tobirama_ in his life, and he can’t keep himself from behaving like an overactive _child_ as he waits.


	3. is turning me to sin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is early as an apology for accidentally deleting over 20K of apex predator yesterday even though i didn't really like it cause Huge Yikes on the other hand i found the comments again!!! i still have the email notifs so i can go back and re-read them
> 
> cw for ableism and some infantilization in this chapter i.e. tobirama is distressed like fucking anyone would be in this situation and people are being dicks to him because of it
> 
> edit: something of a toxic family relationship here like hashi + tobes. do not get along well in this one at all

Peace with the Uchiha. Hashirama has finally done it, finally succeeded in the impossible; he’s gotten Uchiha Izuna to agree to a ceasefire and further negotiations, and he’s done it without losing a single life. 

Well. Hashirama managed to do it without  _killing_  anyone, but to say he’s lost no lives would be  _inaccurate_.

He was so quick to offer up Tobirama, after all, so  _willing_  to sell him to the enemy that killed their younger brothers.

Tobirama sits in his favorite garden by the koi pond, shivering in the early morning chill and too insensate with sheer rage to bother taking in this place, even though it’s the last time he’ll ever see it.

The war has been ended.  _Everyone_  has won.

Tobirama has been sentenced as a sacrificial spouse, a high-ranking Senju that Izuna can feed to his patron god in return for-

-the protection and endorsement of a deity. The blessing of a kami to keep the Clans and the village safe, to allow their war-ravaged people to heal.

It still hurts like nothing else he’s ever known, and it feels like there’s an entire colony of fire ants crawling beneath his skin, biting and burning at him with a vengeance.

Tōka may be the only person who would do anything to keep him home and safe and far away from that altar on the volcano where he’ll meet his death. She’s done everything, really, even fought Hashirama – challenged him to  _death_  – but of course Hashirama won. Of  _course_  he spared her life, telling her gently that everything he does is for the greater good, for their people, for the future.

Not for Tobirama; never for Tobirama. 

He’s spending his last hours in the Senju compound out here, because his other option would be to face Anija, to have to look that infamously loving man in the eyes and know that he considers Tobirama  _expendable,_  knows that he would literally throw him into the fires of hell before abandoning his dream of peace.

As a child, Hashirama had befriended the fire god somehow, had spent every spare minute in the western mountains. He still swears that the being is a _"_ _pacifist"_ just like himself, a warm and overwhelming caretaker who seeks to protect his own from the violence.

The entire Clan still thinks that he just licked too many mushrooms while out training in the forest and that his development had been permanently stunted by it – Tobirama included – but it’s not so funny, thinking about how his brother believes in someone else’s savior, not when he doesn’t extend that same belief to his own family. It’s not so worrying, wondering if Hashirama truly deludes himself so much that he thinks he's  _buddies_  with a kami, not when he gives them so many other, more immediate things to be anxious about.

He's always known his anija was arrogant and self-centered. He’s been doing damage control for Hashirama since they were both very young; the man refuses to acknowledge that there exist perspectives that aren’t his. He refuses to acknowledge the fact that he is only so successful with his _pacifism_ because there is no one strong enough to tell him _no_ and survive it. He refuses to acknowledge his own selfishness, and that’s so goddamn frustrating because he’s so _generous_ at the same time – nearly everything he does is ostensibly for other people, but he has never once considered the thoughts and needs of those other people, always believing so fervently that his way is the only one. Hashirama’s way, the man thinks, is the _best_ way for _everyone,_ and he refuses to hear otherwise.

Not that Tobirama would be willing to try and convince him that he’s _wrong;_ not anymore, anyway.

He’s spoken to his brother once in the two weeks since the agreement was finalized, and it ended in him spending the next three days down by the Nakano, using the natural power of the river to soothe his frustrations and calm his raging chakra.

When he senses Hashirama approaching, he’s powerless to do anything about, powerless as he always seems to be, now. He’s settled into seiza and his muscles are locked from the cold; he can’t really move, and he uses this to give the impression that he hasn’t noticed his brother’s presence.

He’s shivering beneath the thin kimono and the cool weight of the jewelry, and it takes more effort than he can muster to keep from leaning into the warmth that presses up against him when Hashirama sits down.

Tobirama is shaking – either from the lasting chill of the night or from repressed emotion, he’s not sure which – and one hot arm wraps around his shoulders and pulls him in closer to Hashirama’s blazing aura. It used to be comforting, being able to revel in the strength of his anija even when miles away. It was relaxing, sure in the knowledge that his last brother, at least, is more than fully capable of defending himself.

Twenty-four years of trusting this man more than he trusts his own self cannot be undone in fourteen days of dissociation and shock, and against his will Tobirama melts into the embrace. Hashirama gently guides his head down onto one of his shoulders, and the long silken strands of his hair caress one red-marked cheek.

Tobirama does not cry. Tobirama  _cannot_  cry. Tobirama is more conflicted and emotional than he’s ever been in his entire life, and there is no precedent to ground himself with, no facts or logic he can use to anchor himself in understanding as he always does.

Madara is the patron deity of the  _Uchiha_ , and no matter  _what_  Hashirama swears he's seen or done, he is a mysterious entity, an extremely powerful elder god who is almost entirely unknown to Tobirama.

He has  _no idea_  what to expect, and he hopes that Izuna will just toss him into the mouth of the volcano so that he doesn’t have to suffer long.

The rumble of Hashirama’s voice cuts through his foggy thoughts, and Tobirama hates himself for being comforted by the familiarity and the solidity of his anija. He  _cannot_  be fooled by what his senses tell him: no matter how real Hashirama is to the touch, no matter how his warmth reaches into Tobirama’s bones, he is very much not the person he was believed to be, and the disconnect between his acute awareness of that fact and Hashirama’s irritatingly persistent vivacity scrapes at his mind.

“Tobira, Tobira, otouto, I don’t know what to say…”

Tobirama doesn’t speak. He, at least, knows how to remain quiet when he has no conversation prepared, something that Hashirama has never, ever understood.

“…Madara knows you, otouto – well, he knows _of_ you, and he will be good to you.”

 _What._  

“He won’t hurt you, Tobira, not when you’re so important to me; it’s been...a time...since I’ve last gotten to speak to him, but we were discussing you one day a while back, and—he thinks your soul is good, he likes your chakra. Izuna said that I have to sacrifice my life, my heart, my reason for fighting, and there's nothing- _nothing_  more important to me than  _you_. You’ll be  _safe_  with him, Tobira, and if you hate me for the rest of – for the rest of—”

Hashirama’s voice cracks and he’s  _crying,_  weeping more sincerely than he ever has before. It’s too late. He has already lost Tobirama, and no number of tears will save him now.

Every fiber of his being  _screams_  to reach up and hug him, he’s  _so close_  and he needs it  _so badly-_ but Tobirama is frozen still, catatonic and unresponsive in the way he sometimes is, and can’t do anything to stop his brother from sobbing all over him. He couldn’t do anything, not even if he wanted to –  _neither_  of them can at this point, and that seems to be finally sinking in. 

“- _If._  If you  _hate_  me until you die I won’t, won’t try to change your mi-ind, To-bi-ra, but the peace is only a bonus, it’s not—it’s no excuse and I know it, but I do - I’m doing this for  _you,_  Tobirama, there’s—no one,  _no one_  who will hurt you if Madara is your husband, no one who can be cruel to you if Hearth and Home pro-tects you. Not – not even  _me…_ ”

The way Hashirama’s voice breaks on nearly every other word, the way he can barely speak coherently with mucous clogging his nose and his feelings warping his speech – all of it is lost, because of  _course._

Of  _course_  Hashirama thinks he’s being  _protected,_  of course Hashirama thinks he  _needs protection_ , of course the real reason he’s being dressed up prettily and presented to deity on a silver platter is because Tobirama  _cannot be trusted_  to care for himself.

Of course Hashirama drove a stake into the biggest hole in their relationship as brothers and then  _stepped on it_ , thinking that will make him less pathetic and foolish in Tobirama’s eyes. Tobirama has been  _strange_  and  _off_  since he was born in a way that has nothing to do with his albinism – his behaviors are odd, he doesn’t mesh well with new people or new things or big changes, he’s unnaturally oblivious to the finer workings of social interaction and is  _obsessed_  with his jutsus and his training. 

He was bullied about it when he was younger, by his father and his peers, and it always hurt  _Hashirama_  more than it hurt him. Of course Hashirama takes this opportunity to spit in the face of all of Tobirama’s many achievements – impressive even for a  _normal_  person – and rub salt into his wound.

He’s twisted and wrapped around Tobirama now, and his face is visible from this angle. His doe-like eyes are wide and wet, and everything about the way he holds himself suggests that he wants Tobirama to realize how bad his own life has been for his  _elder brother,_  how  _horrible_  his cursed quirks are for  _other people._

It’s enough to finally shatter the overworked remains of Tobirama’s patience and forgiveness, and he brings his hands together stiffly and vanishes to the Hiraishin marker in his room.

Hashirama is still out in the garden, and while there is grief and remorse and more in his chakra signature, the most prominent emotion is  _frustration,_  and it lashes angrily beneath his aura like a caged wildcat _._  Somehow that hurts more than anything else he’s said or done – Anija has always been the one person with endless patience for him, always,  _always_  accommodating of whatever he might need.

Tobirama can sense the Uchiha delegation arriving from the distant smear of smoke and spices in his mind’s eye, and he lays down on the floor to press his cheek against the cool bamboo. They’re going to have him no matter what, but if they refuse to treat Tobirama like a person, he can act like he isn't one, play the freak that they seem to think is his entire person. There's not even one person outside of Tōka - she who understands him because she too is  _deviant_  - who looks at him and thinks about his love for children or tireless maintenance of the gardens instead of how different and cold and odd he is.

He’d thought there was, but cousin Takuma marches into his room and hauls him over to the main audience hall without a care for his dignity, and Hashirama does not stop it, just graces Izuna with an embarrassed smile and apologizes for the trouble.

Tobirama yanks his hand out of Takuma’s grip and does his best to put himself at the point in the room where he’ll be the farthest from every person here. He closes off his senses; he doesn’t want to have to know what kind of hatred and sick glee they’ll derive from the sight of him being handed over to the Uchiha like a lamb destined for slaughter.

His blood  _boils_  when he hears that, but he does not show it - the people here are long since used to his seeming frigidity, and a lack of expression allows him to hide his emotions. Every single time he  _feels_  it's taken to be an outlier and daring to be  _upset_  now would doubtless result in tongues flying about how immature, how wild was the Senju heir, how inappropriate, how good that it is that he's finally  _gone_.

Tobirama hopes the Uchiha’s fire god is a right vengeful bastard, because he doesn’t think he could bear to pretend to like anyone who didn’t understand the violent roil of emotions churning his stomach. He forces himself to relax, to be cold and cool and impersonal, to meet Izuna's dark eyes impassively and let his default scowl scare away anyone who looks at him. 

He hates that he's leaving, wishes it never had to happen, but only because of how easy it will be for the Senju to let him go and forget him. Only because they were so, so willing to send him away, only because they'll celebrate, when the peace comes, and won't have to pretend they aren't glad he's gone.

Only because when he leaves, he abandons his only family, the only people in this world he truly knows, and they don’t bother to see him as anything more than a weapon or an animal. Only because they have never truly loved him as they should – fitting, given their distaste for all things Uchiha. Of course they’d shun familial piety and Tobirama along with it. Of course they are glad to see him finally, finally _gone._

Everyone is, eventually, and he dreads what will happen to him when Madara the kami realizes he’s inferior and _broken,_ a true sacrifice but only in the sense that he won’t be missed; that rejection might shatter him altogether, but he guesses it’s a good thing that Kagutsuchi is built on the mouth of a volcano.

He won’t have to put much effort into his death, and the fire god can rest easily knowing that he’s successfully devoured another human and ridden his people of yet another blight that defaces them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tobirama is so shocked and appalled by That because while he's very used to being sent out to die in battle for his clan, he's not at all used to being married off to gods for his clan, and hed assumed that as the heir that he'd be able to marry who he wanted if he ever made that choice. rationally he realizes that its not technically that different from a regular mission but he's still pissed bc he didn't think hashirama would just throw him away like that even if it's not really what's happening


	4. it's not my fault

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kdjsfhjkadshf dont have anything to say this time except im really not pleased w/ this chapter but. WhatEver

Uchiha Izuna is a pragmatic individual not typically prone to flirting with death so blatantly, but it seems that the recent leave Hi no Kuni has collectively taken from all common sense has not spared him.

It’s not like he can afford to let his ‘brother’ just backslide into senility without a fight. It’s his duty as the religious leader of the Uchiha to pay weekly tribute to their patron kami, and as a result they’ve developed a very close-knit relationship; Izuna is one of perhaps a handful of people who can claim to have a personal bond with Madara. As a result, he’s perfectly familiar with the god’s blustery nature and his frequent departures from what would, in any other being, be considered something like _sanity._  

This? This is something else altogether.

He’s spent hundreds of hours on his knees at the altar in the heart of the Clan compound, praying and holding services and taking immaculate care of Madara’s beautiful shrine, and – and now the god is just going to _throw it all away?_ Izuna has been his most fervent disciple in _years_ and he just doesn’t _matter_ now that there’s a demon in his life?

“You don’t even _know_ Senju Tobirama, why would you _possibly_ want him as a _bride._ Madara-sama.” 

Madara’s face is mostly hidden behind the bristly black curtain of his bangs - a fluffy mane of hair that leaves only one coal-dark eye exposed most of the time – but what is visible flushes slate-gray in what actually seems to be a _blush._ He shakes his head, sending tendrils of smoky hair flying about him, and Izuna can’t even focus on the divine picture he makes, because for the first time in his life, he’s witnessing his god be- 

- _Shy._ Shy and sheepish, smiling softly like a kunoichi-in-training at the thought of the man he’s going to take to be his betrothed, paying no more heed to Izuna than he would to a chunk of feldspar.

Something dark and hideous with the slimy texture of oil writhes in the pit of his stomach, and he doesn’t bother to quash it. Senju Tobirama has _stolen_ Madara from him, from his _Clan_ , and Izuna will make no efforts to be even remotely kind, not when the icy bastard is so horrifyingly ungrateful for this opportunity, an opportunity he’d never deserve in a hundred thousand years – an opportunity _no one_ would deserve in a hundred thousand years, because Madara is a god, and he is so stunningly _perfect_ that humans, flawed as they are, could never truly appreciate him.

“I’m sorry, my lord,” he says, icy and cold, (just like his aniki’s future bride, that horrible man who _isn’t_ an Uchiha! How _fitting._ ) “you want me to do _what,_ now?” Madara cannot be asking what he thinks he is. It just – it just _cannot_ be happening, because if it is, Izuna might actually _die_ of his repressed emotions, and he hasn’t get gotten a guarantee that he’ll be able to spend his afterlife hanging around here, staying with his not-brother and keeping watch over his Clan from afar.

[ **I want you to treat Tobirama well, little brother,** ] the fire god rumbles, using the white demon’s _name_ so casually, like that man in particular isn’t responsible for hundreds of Uchiha cremations. He’s still blushing like a _maiden,_ like he and the Senju are properly _courting_ instead of just being immediately married, like he _knows_ the man and loves him despite his overwhelming faults.

What the hell is _happening?_  

“What the _hell_ is happening,” is what comes out of his mouth, because he really has no self-control, even though he’s already twenty-four and a Clan Head to boot. Oh, Juuno will laugh at him _so hard_ when she finds out he badmouthed their _god_ about his future marriage.

Given, of course, that he’s not incinerated first.

He’s not, but only because Madara actually _sighs dreamily_ and plays with the skirts of his ceremonial robes like a lovestruck virgin, which – he fucking _is,_ isn’t he. 

[ **The Senju heir, Tobirama. He’s supposed to be the strongest Suiton user the Elemental Countries have ever known…and the loveliest, too. Oh, oh, Izuna, you’ve seen him, tell me. What does he look like? Is he…is he handsome** **? The yōkai say that he is but sometimes they lie…** ]

The expression on the kami’s face is so desperately hopeful that it takes real effort for Izuna not to burst out laughing right then and there. He - wants to know if Senju is _attractive?_ That albino bastard, _beautiful?_

…He is, actually, almost unfairly so, but it’s not like Madara needs to know that, and maybe if Izuna tries hard enough, he’ll be able to convince him to drop this ridiculous marriage pretense and consume Tobirama with the Amaterasu like a proper sacrifice.

“He looks like a nogitsune,” Izuna snaps, because technically that’s true – with his thin, elegant face and sharp, well-sculpted features, Tobirama really does appear rather vulpine, and he _is_ evil, so. It’s not inaccurate. Just thinking about the man in any kind of positive light makes hives run up and down the length of his spine, and the approving sparkle of Madara’s eyes does absolutely _nothing_ to help, because _gross._  

It’s bad enough knowing that Madara wants Tobirama as a _spouse,_ like, to be _married_ to, rather than just a normal present that he can play with and then burn to death, but – to think that the kami that’s practically family to him _carnally desires_ the Senju heir, demonic and icy as he is?

It’s a little too much for Izuna, thanks.

[ **I knew it,** ] Madara rumbles, and the look on his face is almost _disgustingly_ smug even as it’s oddly intent. Is he… _angry_ about something? [ **I knew Hashirama’s baby brother was invaluable. Oh, Izuna, otouto, he’s going to be my _husband,_ you know, and he’ll be all mine, and no one will be able to take him from me. Not any of the Senju, not any of my subordinates, not even _you._** ]

…Yeah. Isn’t that the whole point of marriage? Izuna doesn’t say it aloud, because only the Sage knows how poorly his not-aniki would react to that, but the way the Uchiha engage in relationships is famously monogamous, and although it’s a concept he’s still struggling with, he has to admit that Tobirama is one of theirs now, and that he truly does belong to Madara, heart and soul, as – as Madara will belong to him as well.

It’s disturbing, really, and he doesn’t know what the hell kind of nonsense Senju Hashirama told Madara about his sibling to put that god-awful expression on his flawless face, but he hates it already.

(He isn’t angry because this means his own devotion to Madara means _nothing_ now, and never will. He isn’t upset because that bastard Senju just fucking _stole_ their god from him, and he probably won’t even be _grateful._ Tobirama will never deserve Madara – not the beautiful Madara, the aristocratic Madara, the warm, loving Madara, and most certainly not the soft Madara with his small smiles and crinkled black eyes, the one that only Izuna gets to see, as is his _right_. He’ll _never_ deserve him, and it burns like fire for Izuna to know that he himself won’t, either. None of the Uchiha will, and it’s agonizing in a hitherto unknown way for him to learn that his Clan, _Madara’s_ Clan, the Clan that sets aside pieces of their too-big, too-bright hearts for his sole dedication, is inferior somehow to _Senju Tobirama_.

Madara’s always seen him as more of a little sibling, anyway, and the bond between them as Uchiha Clan Head and Uchiha kami would have never been the kind of bond Izuna truly yearns for, but at least there wouldn’t be a frigid albino separating them.)

“Have you been listening to that bastard Senju Head again, Madara? Is this why you’re so intent on my _literal rival?”_

[ **Izuna. Izuna. Holy shit, Izuna-** ]

“Oh my god, _what._ Have you finally figured out what a bad idea this is?”

[ **How do you have sex? With a human?** ]

He actually _gapes_ at his aniki, opening and closing his mouth noiselessly like a landed carp. Madara himself looks sinfully unrepentant, and his smirk is burned onto the insides of Izuna’s eyelids when he screws his eyes shut and claps his hands over his ears to protect himself from having to hear any more of this vile _nonsense._

[ **I would very much like to pleasure him, you know. Isn’t it the duty of a husband, to provide for and satisfy the _needs_ of their spouse?**]

Izuna nearly throws himself into the damn volcano then and there, and the raucous thunder of Madara’s laughter follows him all the way back to the Uchiha compound, despite his best efforts to burn his memory of the conversation out of his head altogether.


	5. that in god's plan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AIGHT AIGHT AIGHT SO
> 
> It is not happening this chapter but. i promise that It will happen soon
> 
> the italicized blocks of text are tobirama's dreams; they aren't really happening
> 
> CW for: rape, sexual assault, obsessive behavior, domestic violence (?)
> 
> none of that actually happens but tobirama has nightmares about it
> 
> thank you all for all your lovely comments they really helped me get this done :-) fun fact so did just sitting down and writing it lmao. turns out i can be very productive if i do that which i never do

_Dark, covetous eyes rake him in from head to toe and back again, glittering with some deep, incomprehensible madness that makes Tobirama want to shrink back and hide._

_In the dying light of day, surrounded by the hazy smog of the caldera, the elder god glows in a hundred thousand jewel-tones, shining in shades of red and gold and orange like liquid fire as the smoke-stained sunset throws heavy shadows onto the sharp lines of his face and torso. Around him, the massive halo of his bristly black hair shifts and steams, puffing up like a living thing as it cloaks his upper half in darkness and mystery._

_Madara of the Uchiha. God of fire, Keeper of the Divine Hearth, sole possessor of the holy flames of Amaterasu._

_Patron deity of Tobirama’s sworn enemies, and as of today, his husband._

_It is he and he alone who can calm the volcano in its rages, he and he alone who can stir it into wakefulness when punishment is required, he and he alone who can guide the bellicose Uchiha into peace; it is he and he alone who Tobirama now belongs to, like - like a mere **thing,** like some object to be taken and held and **owned** as though he’s not a breathing person._

_As though he hasn’t lost absolutely everything in the past month and is still struggling to piece the remains of his life back together._

_As the monstrous man gets closer and closer, his skin begins to sizzle and burn, and Tobirama winces at the way the heat melts his brain and his nerve endings and destroys his higher thinking functions. He’s nauseous and sick and swaying on the spot, and he’s helpless to do anything, even run, as the god approaches, stalking towards him with the deliberate malice of a tiger playing with its prey, and that’s what he is now – prey._

_That’s what he’s been reduced to._

_He flinches back as one clawed, coal-black hand reaches out to touch his shoulder, and he doesn’t cry out when blisters bubble up and burst beneath the unholy temperature of Madara’s grip. He’s hot, so hot, **too** hot, and Tobirama wavers once, twice, before regaining his balance, shoving the talons off of him and hissing at contact. Before he knows it his hands, reddened and damaged as they are, are flickering through the long string of signs required to perform his first and favorite Suiton jutsu._

_Madara stumbles back like he’s been stabbed, eyes wide and flaring into the ruby of the Sharingan, glowing and spinning like lit coals, and –_

_\- nothing happens. The Water Dragon Missile does not appear; there isn’t enough moisture in the air for him to simply draw the requisite water out of the sky, and the nearest source of it would be the Nakano, hundreds of meters below them and many more away._

_[ **Bride,** ] Madara rasps, looking wounded, like he has any right to. He looks genuinely upset, like he could possibly know what that feels like when Tobirama’s lost his family and his home and his life and everything he’s ever known. His voice is warped with shock, like he wasn’t expecting him to try and fight back, and something dark in him delights at that – let him try to fuck Tobirama. Let him try to **care** for Tobirama._

_He’ll get what he deserves if he does._

_[ **Bride, what exactly do you think you’re doing?** ]_

_“My name,” he snaps icily, fisting his hands in the skirts of his wedding kimono, “is Senju Tobirama, and I am not your fucking wife.”_

_[ **Husband, then,** ] Madara says dismissively. [ **Are you displeased? Why? I am not an inadequate spouse.** ]_

_Why – why is he **displeased**? Tobirama has to bark out a harsh, acidic laugh at that. Why the fuck wouldn’t he be?_

_“My brother sold me to be some demon’s fucktoy,” he snarls, advancing on the god and reveling in the vindictive joy he gets from the way Madara scrambles back and away from him with wide Sharingan eyes. “I’m well within my rights to be furious about that.”_

_Madara peels back his lips to bare his mouthful of fangs in a growl, and the noise that reverberates in his chest sounds like a rockslide that echoes throughout Tobirama’s entire being, shaking him to his core. [ **Some – demon? You don’t understand your situation now, do you, husband?** ]_

_He gets up close and personal, leaning down – gods, he must be at **least** eight feet tall, more with the hair and the horns – to press his noble face right up against Tobirama’s. He has no place to look beyond the spinning pinwheel of the Mangekyō Sharingan, glowing red-hot like lit coals and rotating in a cyclic, wave-like pattern. Tobirama slams his eyes shut and prepares himself for a genjutsu, but when none comes, the feeling of terror boiling deep in the pit of his gut does not abate; only intensify._

_[ **You’re mine now, pretty Senju. You belong to me and me alone and I don’t intend to let you forget that. You want to be free so badly? Fine, then. You can make a choice. Isn’t that what you want, To-bi-ra-ma? To be able to choose your own fate?** ]_

_A massive hand, coated thickly in scales and tipped in wicked, serrated claws, reaches down and forward to wrap around his neck like a vice. The blazing heat of Madara’s touch immediately burns the skin underneath, searing through the epidermis and rubbing painfully against the strangely soft velvet of his paw-like pads. In moments, the grip is tightening, tightening, tightening, and Tobirama is helpless to do anything but watch as the fire god lifts him clean into the air and just – walks with him, carrying him by the neck like a marionette with cut strings and bringing him closer to –_

_\- closer to the caldera, closer to the vent, closer to the actual mouth of the volcano and further away from Kagutsuchi and where he assumes the ritual altar is._

_[ **Riddle me this, husband. If you had to pick between two things – between a life with me as my treasured pet, or between the lava I could throw you in at any moment now – which would you select?** ]_

_“I – choose—” Tobirama gasps out the words, but the hand around his throat squeezes harder, and his weakening air supply is cut off altogether. He’s completely at Madara’s mercy like this, completely defenseless and utterly vulnerable. His shinobi instincts scream and roar within him at the indignity, and a thousand different escape plans begin to formulate in the back of his head, but none of them would work._

_He has a choice to make, but that doesn’t matter._

_It would seem that Madara has already decided for him._

_[ **Choose me,** ] the kami whispers in his ear, releasing the death-grip on his neck just enough that he can gasp for breath again. Instead of dropping him into the roiling pit of magma, though, Madara just scoops him up properly into his arms, pressing him against his massive chest like he’s a child and tucking his head gently into searing heat of the dip where his neck joins his shoulder. [ **Choose me, precious one, or your pyre. Be**_ **mine _or you will burn…_** _]_

Tobirama wakes from his nightmare with a gasp, shooting up in bed and gulping for clean, cool air free of sulfur and soot. It was just a dream. Just a dream. Just a fucking _dream,_ damn it, and even if it had felt so real – even if he could have sworn that he felt his flesh carbonizing under the flaming touch of the fire god – it wasn’t.

Just a dream.

There’s no light streaming into the closed shoji doors that grant Tobirama’s borrowed room a modest modicum of privacy, and his internal clock tells him that it’s still practically night; he only managed to get three or four hours of sleep, but with the roiling in his stomach and the nausea clawing its way up his throat, he doubts he’ll be able to get any more.

Damned, then, to another day of too-heavy eyelids and too-fuzzy thought. He would try for more rest, but –

_Glossy black hair, cruel dark eyes, a mouth bristling with oversized fangs. Flame and ash and death and sweat and blood._

_Madara._

_Too hot, too hot, too big, too rough, too painful – too much, but he doesn’t **stop,** just keeps going and going and going, ripping and tearing and taking so brutally that Tobirama isn’t sure that he’ll ever be able to walk again._

_Hashirama – Tobirama knows that Hashirama’s word should mean nothing to him now, but still, he **promised,** he was his anija and the center of his universe and he’d **promised** that the fire god would be kind and gentle when in reality he was anything but._

_Tobirama doesn’t know if the water tracing down his cheeks is sweat or tears. Probably both. It’s just…_

_…he’d never imagined that he would ever have a husband, and he’d certainly never imagined that his husband would be…like **that.**_

_[ **Precious,** ] coos Madara in that horrible tone he uses to talk down to Tobirama, the very same tone that had been used by people like Butsuma, only twisted to be sugar-sweet and tooth-achingly false. [ **Precious bride, only mine, all mine…** ]_

\- he just can’t sleep, is all.

Rolling up and out of the futon, Tobirama pops his spine into place with a catlike stretch and a jaw-splitting yawn. It’s still hideously early, but he’s not going back to bed; he might as well get a start on his morning katas, as long as he’s quiet and careful enough not to wake anyone.

When Tobirama pads silently into the main room of the Uchiha main house, ready to fix himself some tea and slowly drag himself into full wakefulness, he’s somewhat surprised to note Izuna already up and sitting by the lit kotatsu; he’d not been searching for anything with his sensor’s sight, not wanting to be overwhelmed by the fiery lines of energy that compose the world seen through chakric vision, and so he hadn’t expected anybody else to be awake at this time of night.

From the haunted expression of his face and the hollow set of his cheeks, Tobirama gathers that he’s not the only one who’s been having night terrors, and some small piece of hatred within him cracks and withers when he thinks about that. He’s always managed to hold on to animosity for Izuna thanks to the deaths of his brothers at the hands of Uchiha child-killers, but – Izuna would have only been a child, then, not even the heir at that point. He wasn’t responsible.

It’s hard, he finds, to hang on to his bitterness in the face of something so mundane and inherently human and draining as a bad dream, and – there’s already another cup set out. Izuna doesn’t look up at him, doesn’t greet him, but he doesn’t snarl and snap and scowl, either, which is a marked improvement over the past few days.

They drink gyokuro in silence for nearly half an hour before Izuna bothers to break it with the irritating sound of his voice, and Tobirama holds his first real conversation with the man just as dawn breaks, bringing peachy-gray light shining in through the walls and windows and lighting up the painted paper panels from behind.

“You’re drinking my fucking tea, Senju demon,” is what he opens with.

“How remarkably perceptive of you,” Tobirama responds dryly, taking a long, impolite sip of his gyokuro and slurping at it obnoxiously just to revel in the way it makes his sort-of rival’s face twitch. “You’re just letting me do it, so I figured that it was all right.”

“You didn’t _ask,_ ” he grumbles, but he doesn’t argue the point, and Tobirama figures that they’re good as even.

“Why would I ask you for anything, Izuna-san? I don’t want poisoned tea, and I certainly don’t want to have to talk to you to get to it. This isn’t even made properly, Uchiha, I’m disappointed.”

A snort, an eyeroll, and the gentle click of porcelain.

“Like I’d poison you so early in the morning. No, if you’re going to die today, Tobirama, it will be tonight, and I’ll be able to be there for it. You can have the tea for now – it’ll be one of the last things you ever drink.”

Ah, he thinks, there it is. The wedding really will end in his death, then. It’s – honestly _relieving,_ knowing that he won’t have to bear a life as some kami’s concubine, left to get soft and lazy and scarred over with sedimentary layers of burns and blisters – he genuinely fears that over pretty much anything else. Tobirama is a weapon, a tool of combat, to be wielded in defense of his home and his people, to be used to cut away enemies and mysteries alike; he doesn’t think he could survive the civilian lifestyle of a pampered sacrifice.

“Mm. Better to die for the peace, I suppose, then have to spend the rest of my life sitting on my ass and fucking your god for it.”

Izuna purses his lips and sets down his teacup, narrowing dark eyes thoughtfully and scanning over Tobirama’s admittedly rumpled form. His skin is tacky and sticky with sweat and his hair is no doubt a mess, but otherwise he just looks like himself, which is – less than impressive.

Tired, probably, but when isn’t he? He can’t remember a time in the past decade when he’s been allowed to slow down and just _rest,_ and he’d be lying if he said that he wasn’t looking forward to the Pure Lands, to seeing his brothers and his mother, just because of that.

“Do you really want this, Tobirama? The peace, I mean. I gather that you’re not _thrilled_ about becoming Madara-sama’s bride, but it’s not like you deserve him anyway…do you really hate the Uchiha, or are you just tired like everybody else?”

 _Exhausted,_ he wants to say. _So unbelievably tired of fighting and surviving and living and breathing and continuing when I have no point anymore. Anija doesn’t want me, the Senju don’t want me, Madara surely won’t want me, and there’s no purpose to me anymore. I’m just ornamental, now. Just a pretty vase to be displayed in Kagutsuchi._

Izuna cradles his head in his hand, tapping long fingers against his cheek and humming absently.

“Hmm…well, I suppose it doesn’t matter, now. Anyway, I’m glad you came out. I have something for you.”

“Oh?” Despite himself, Tobirama finds his interest piqued; he’s been wondering when and if Izuna was ever going to get over his heinous attitude and decide to be something like _kind_ to the man who’s going to be the spouse of his Clan’s patron deity.

Izuna nods and rifles around in his robe for a moment before pulling out a small, hinged box, coated in crushed black velvet and—

“Uchiha,” Tobirama says, eyeing the jewelry box warily, “you do know that I’m already engaged, don’t you? To your god? Flattering as this is—”

“Oh, shut _up,_ Senju, it’s not a ring. Just – take it, will you? You won’t survive the journey up the mountain without them and you certainly won’t survive _Aniki_ without them, unless you’re unusually keen on being burned to death from the inside out.”

Being a person of good sense who was not, in fact, unusually keen on being burned to death from the inside out, Tobirama takes the box and pops it open to reveal a beautiful pair of sapphire stud earrings, strange symbols scratched into the surfaces of the gemstones and the platinum basing humming with Water chakra.

“They’re beautiful,” he whispers, because they _are_ – chakra-reinforced jewelry is incredibly rare, since the only blacksmiths who know how to fold together chakra and metal and rock are the Uzumaki, who charge a fortune for their finery; Tobirama can only imagine how much these earrings must have _cost_ the Uchiha, with the star sapphires being as large as they are and the underlying sealwork – because it is sealwork, he can tell that much – being as complicated and powerful as it is when tied to such a small object.

“They’re Uzumaki sealing earrings,” Izuna says gruffly. “Sapphires are the very essence of ice, and when you wear these, you’ll be effectively heatproof; you won’t burn, you won’t catch fire, you won’t need to take any countermeasures to be able to touch your – your husband. They were really fucking expensive, Senju bastard, so you better appreciate them.”

“I do,” he blurts out without thinking, because he’d been _wondering_ how the hell he was supposed to get close enough to Madara to be married to him without going up in flame.

“All right, then,” Izuna replies, his heavy-lidded dark eyes watching Tobirama with a strange intensity that he can’t hope to parse. “Blessings to you, Senju Tobirama. Gods know how much you’ll need it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact of the day: my bed is very comfortable and it is what i picture whenever i describe the beds in my fics. plushy and cozy with furry blankets and flannel sheets. Hell Yeah Babey
> 
> i think autistic tobirama (that is to say canon tobirama) loves kids so much because they're honest and straightforward and haven't really learned hate yet. also all kids want to know practically everything if youre a decent teacher which he is so he gets to nourish young minds and that makes him very happy :-)
> 
> i might fuck around and let him become like an isolated volcano sensei who hosts kids in his temple-house and teaches them about chakra and shit i think that would be a peaceful and fulfilling career for him


	6. [SCRAPPED]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know it's been almost a month but im not sorry because school is really picking up and also ive been working super hard on this cause it's like. the penultimate chapter. it's where That happens. as such it's a little longer than normal
> 
> i wanted it up in time for my birthday and so it is!!! im 17!!!! young and sweet, the dancing queen,
> 
> sorry 2 be a bitch but if you could comment it would really mean a lot to me :,-) all feedback is good feedback and every time the comment notification pops up it feels like ive gotten a lil present

Tobirama refuses to wince as the Uchiha artisan takes her sharpened bamboo rod and stabs it into the back of his left hand, leaving a thin line of red ink behind it. The woman doesn’t meet his gaze as she crafts the tattoo with the delicate surety of a sealing master, instead pouring the entirety of her focus into her craft, for which he is admittedly glad; he doesn’t want to bear a faulty seal on his body for the rest of his life, and he knows from one of Mito’s Handmaidens just how painful that is.

(Apparently Saikari Kyashi was the first person on Uzushio to discover just what a bad idea getting tattooed while drunk off their ass is. She’s never told Tobirama the full story, which is a shame, because the near-constant sensation of the glitching static of the storage seals inked along her spine is endlessly fascinating to his chakra-sense. Mito frowns whenever he tries to bother her about it, and he thinks that it was probably her idea in the first place, and that Kyashi was the first Handmaiden stupid enough to take the concept and run with it. Not that she’s an idiot, of course, but…

Really, Tobirama thinks, remembering her attempt to eat twenty bowls of ramen in one sitting and the subsequent food poisoning that had plagued her for weeks, she kind of is.)

The sealing tattoo is a kind of a summoning contract, or so he’s been told. It will permit him to call upon his new husband whenever he wishes as long as he smears his own blood across the back, and though Madara has no talent with space-time jutsus, he should be able to latch onto the energy signature of the tattoo from a great distance and then send a chakra shade to tend to whatever needs he may have.

“Hold still,” the tattoo artist instructs him sharply, her voice snapping in the low silence of the sterilized shrine. “If you move, I’ll mess this up.”

Tobirama clenches down on his muscles, locking them into stillness as the Uchiha woman dips her bamboo needles in crimson ink and then returns to her task. He glares idly down at the back of his hand, watching as the delicate lines of red slowly spread across his skin and trying to dissect the construction of the seal. It doesn’t really look like anything he’s ever created or seen before, but then, most mainland seals, if they exist at all, are wildly different from Uzushio-style fūinjutsu; it only makes sense that he wouldn’t be able to recognize the style.

The sun is beginning to set by the time the tattoo is finished, and when Tobirama has survived a final ritual bath, it’s time.

It’s the evening of the vernal equinox, and finally it will be safe for him to be married to Madara. When the day meets the night, when the spirit world touches the material, when yōkai take shape amidst humanity and when chakra burns high and bright with the dissolution of the barriers that separate the natural from the supernatural; this is when their union will be at its strongest, when god and mortal can be bound together for all of eternity.

Tobirama has gathered at this point that he’s not just a fancy sacrifice – he really is the kami’s intended bride, and he won’t be immediately killed unless he is unsatisfactory to the extreme in some manner or another. He’s doomed to live out the rest of his days as Madara’s bitch.

He thinks that he’d rather die.

Mt. Shōja looms before him, its great rugged shape casting long shadows across the forest that crawls up its slopes and its far-away mouth spitting smog and steam into the air, billowing up in plumes of cloudy gray that twist and waver and dissipate into the late afternoon. It truly is a beautiful evening; the sky is painted in shattered shades of pale blue and purple and red-orange, and the last light of day filters in through the leaves of the trees in a wash of dim emerald.

It feels like forever, but soon enough the hours tick by, and before he knows it, Kagutsuchi looms before him in its full glory, a towering temple of gleaming obsidian and igneous rock, its wooden accoutrements glowing with fireproofing seals.

Time seems to slow down as Tobirama approaches the mon guarding the entrance. They’re gilded and beautiful, painted a bright ruby red and strung with shimenawa ropes that are somehow not burning; as he passes beneath them, something within him seems to shift. He’s taken his first steps into his new life as a sacrificial husband for the fire god, and he’ll never be the same again.

It feels oddly mundane. Objectively, Tobirama _knows_ his entire life is different now, but he doesn’t really feel like it – he’s still just _him,_ Senju (Uchiha?) Tobirama, a shinobi and a tool.

Now, though, he’s a sword to be wielded for peace instead of war, an ornamental weapon never intended to see the light of battle but instead existing to represent the accomplishment of the impossible. He’d admit that he’s the first person who could be considered _biased_ about the entire affair, but he’ll stand by his conviction that his sacrifice _was not necessary;_ he’ll hold on to the low-smoldering coals of his righteous anger until he _dies_.

Not even Madara himself could make him change his mind.

…He’s allowing himself the luxury of being selfish, for once. He knows that this is not really any more different than taking on dangerous missions for the sake of the Clan that is no longer his. It’s not any worse than when he himself has to armor up for war and send Senju out to die for their own continued survival.

(It is so, _so_ different; this time his soul belongs to a _god._ This time he will not even be allowed a glorified death on the battlefield. He will be killed saving his kin – he’ll be killed as proof of purchase for their futures, for the futures of people who never loved him the way they should have. 

He’s never gotten the chance to live a life outside of the war, and now he never will.) 

“Senju. I think you’re finally ready.”

Tobirama’s snapped out of his introspection by Izuna’s voice, and he looks up to see the man standing tall and proud by the doors of the temple, his face set into something cold and stony and his dark eyes glittering with hate. He gives Tobirama an inquisitive once-over, his glare burning through the silken layers of the kimono to peer into his very soul.

…No real change there, then, and the familiarity of Izuna’s anger is such a relief in the midst of all the rapid changes that Tobirama nearly sighs audibly in thanks. He’s not in a totally different world; not yet, at least.

“Am I?” Tobirama queries, just to be contrary. “It feels like I’ve been hung.” He rests his hands on the wide silver-white obi tied about his waist so tightly that his organs protest with every breath.

The Dress is the most beautiful article of clothing that he’s ever seen. It’s a glorious silk kimono, black and deep ocean blue like the inky midnight sky, almost entirely coated in fiery embroidery of headache-inducing intricacy. The red-gold threads shine like liquid flame in the light of the dying sun, tracing elaborate patterns along the length of the enormous, billowing sleeves and following the flowing pool of his long skirt.

The fact that it was made in the women’s style is not lost on him, and by the dirty smirk that Izuna sends his way when he has to hoist up the trailing edges of the sleeves so that they don’t drag in the coal dust, the slight was intentional. He’s dressed more like a bride than anything else, even if he remains very definitely a man; maybe, he thinks with some amusement, Madara is straight, and they’re going to try and pass him off as a very masculine woman.

He chooses to be the better man and ignore the belligerent Uchiha and approaches the basalt steps leading up into Kagutsuchi, careful to sweep up his skirts so that he doesn’t trip over them, and when Izuna throws open the temple doors with a dangerous irreverence, Tobirama finally sees _him._ A figure all in black and red, limned in golden light from the enormous blazing brazier that stands in front of him.

Before him stands Madara, tall and imposing and different, somehow, than Tobirama had been expecting. In his human form they’re roughly the same height – Tobirama might even be taller – and although he’s a good deal bulkier and more muscular, he just looks like a _person._ Fancily dressed, maybe, with that elaborate-looking armor and the dark silken mantle, but—

Then he turns around to face the two humans. Then Tobirama gets close enough to see him properly through the haze of the myopia. Then the world as he knows it falls apart.

His skin is a pale chalk gray, shot through with spiderwebs of sparkling coal black. His hair is almost normal, but he doesn’t fail to notice the way its great spiky shape flutters and shifts unnaturally in the hot, stagnant air inside the temple, and for a frightening moment he wonders if it’s sentient. He can only see one Sharingan eye through Madara’s thick curtain of bangs, but it is the very same cyclic pinwheel that’s embroidered on the back of The Dress; fitting, then, that his new crest signifies his belonging not just to the Uchiha but to their _god._ The kami is dressed in bright blood red and charcoal gray, wearing a thick, heavy mantle beneath plated ornamental armor so intricately decorated with gilding that it makes Tobirama’s head spin just to look at it.

[ **You are Senju Tobirama,** ] the fire god states, his voice booming so loudly in the oppressive silence of Kagutsuchi that it’s a miracle that the foundations remain whole. It’s a sentence, not a question. 

He clearly already knows.

Tobirama fights the nervous urge to swallow and he steels himself, meeting his new husband’s gaze with his habitual glare and tipping up his chin so that Madara has to raise his face to meet his eyes. “I am,” he replies, but it sounds so small and sad when he says it out loud like that.

Everything about him seems so small and sad in comparison to the kami.

[ **Come to me, bride,** ] Madara commands, holding out one clawed, long-fingered hand and motioning impatiently for Tobirama to come to his side. He does so, not even grumbling under his breath about the feminine form of address; Madara would more than likely be able to hear him, and then Tobirama would die.

He’s not seeing a whole lot of outcomes to this scenario that don’t end in his own death. 

When Tobirama reaches him, the first thing Madara does is extend one arm out to touch hesitantly at one of his red-marked cheeks. If he didn’t know better, he’d say that the god seemed almost _reverent_ – his motions are clearly telegraphed so as not to scare Tobirama away and his strong arms are as close to quivery as he imagines that deities can physically get. 

When the hand cups his face, caressing the length of his cheekbone to his chin, he slams his eyes shut and tries not to fixate on the sensation of Madara’s touch. It’s not burning, not harmful, not dangerous the way it had been in his nightmares; it’s not even uncomfortably hot. His hands are large and dry and warm, and it’s _ridiculous_ , but something about being held like this almost makes Tobirama feel _safe_ —

A burst of chakra enters his tenketsu channels, and holy fucking _shit._ It can’t be more than a drop of power, but the energy billows and burns high and fills him with such unbearably bright ecstasy that Tobirama thinks for a moment that he’s died. it feels like the sun, contained within his skin; there are no words that can be properly used to describe the sensation, because humans are not capable of inventing language that could do it any remote shred of justice. It feels like Mt. Shōja is erupting within his chakra coils, his body flooding high with something so raw and powerful and intense that it can only be Madara’s core chakra. It feels - it feels like - 

—it feels like home.

He might be on his knees, crying. Anything is possible, really. Reality has been destroyed for him, everything but the blaze in his mind blankly erased and consumed by the fire that now roars within him.

[ **Perfect** ,] Madara whispers, stroking worshipfully at the length of his tattoos. [ **Absolutely, unequivocally perfect. I understand, now, why Hashirama holds you so dear, my lovely bride; I have never seen such flawless power among the human race, nor have I known it to be so - beautiful**.] 

“Excuse me?” Tobirama croaks, throat dry - it’s all he can manage at the moment. His mind has been blown. “You - me - beautiful - what?”

When he opens his eyes in shock, Madara’s face fills his field of vision. There’s a soft, loving smile there, so warm and so viscerally pleased that it makes Tobirama’s heart stutter to a stop in his chest.

[ **Perfect, incredible, beyond all expectation** ,] Madara repeats, his voice patient and melty and embarrassingly attractive with its gravelly rumble. [ **Take your pick of adjectives, sweetest one; there are simply no words that I can think of to properly describe you. I would be sorry for your Clan, being bereft of such a treasure, were you not now mine and mine alone. As it is, that’s their loss. You belong to _me_ now, my love, and they are no longer worthy of you, if it could be said that they ever were in the first place.**] 

“Wh— _love?”_

[ **How could I not? You are - simply put - the single most magnificent being I have ever known. I am the most fortunate man on earth to have you for my husband**.] 

Tobirama’s brain stalls for a long moment on that word, on that concept, on the implications and the emotions, and then it reboots, and he regains his sanity. The fire within goes out, and he feels its loss like a missing limb for a moment before he remembers, and he jerks back and away from Madara’s hold like it actually burns.

He remembers. He can’t be permitted to trust the god, can’t be allowed to sink into the dream of his affection, can’t be let to love again; Hashirama destroyed that possibility for him, and he won’t begin to consider it now just because his husband sees fit to pretend that they’re happily married and that their relationship wasn’t always doomed to fail from the start.

Tobirama simply wasn’t _made_ for love. He’s too cold, too strange, too abnormal; hearing Madara talk about how much the Senju must be missing him makes his heart ache with a too-familiar pain, because they _aren’t._ They never have and they never will. 

Anija has probably already forgotten about him at this point, now that he has the village. Mito is pregnant, and so Tōka will be more concerned with her wife than with her aberrant, missing cousin. Mito herself has a hundred thousand small concerns tugging at her attention on the daily, and she’ll likely be the one to take up the weight he’d pulled for Hashirama as Clan Head now that he’s gone.

For Madara to Want him, to see him and immediately declare him _beautiful,_ for a stranger – a _deity_ – to see past his hundreds of flaws in a way none of his family members have ever managed to do in his twenty-four years of life hurts him so deeply that he can’t truly begin to articulate it. 

Tobirama gathers up his skirt and his sleeves and he storms out of Kagutsuchi, making for the caldera. His sandals sizzle and steam on the volcanic vents beneath his feet, and he can feel sweat dripping down his face; the suffocating heat of Mt. Shōja’s peak is no dream, is no illusion, and behind him, he can hear Izuna shouting for him to stop, to come back, but he doesn’t care.

His decision is already made.

The earrings do their work, and by the time his sandals melt, his feet are only sort of burned; The Dress is smoking, moments away from catching flame, and when his bangs fall into his face without his happuri faceguard to hold them back he notes that they’re slightly singed instead of literally on fire like they should be, given his proximity to the mouth of the volcano.

Out of breath and out of time, he stumbles to a stop at the cliff’s edge of the crater. The vent gapes open before him, magma bubbling and hissing and spitting up smoke in a thick curtain of gray that stings at his eyes, bringing tears to fall down his cheeks. The heat here is unbearable, and the dress is actually burning, now, but Tobirama can’t bring himself to mind.

He channels chakra into the soles of his feet and with a single great leap, he hurls himself into the mouth of Mt. Shōja, closing his eyes and letting himself drop through the air in a bundle of silk and smoke.


	7. he made the devil so much stronger than the man

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok so i was stuck on this for literally months before it occurred to me that the issue was not with the non-existent chapter 7, but with the very hastily written chapter six, so here is another extremely hastily written chapter six that is not quite so up front with the whole suicide thing but hopefully has plenty of drama and suspense for yall to get your claws into

The world is awash in black-red-gray, the sky stained to darkness by the ever-present cloak of smoke that pours out of the mouth of the volcano. Dragonglass glitters in the weak light thrown off by streams of boiling rock. Cracks spiderweb through the rough slate ground, lit golden-orange from within and radiating such intense heat that the air shimmers with its nearness.

There is nothing green or growing in the caldera of Mt. Shōja – not with the oppressive atmosphere of molten temperatures and perpetual smog – and Tobirama feels the loss of life like a blindfold of his sensor’s sight. Normally he has some peripheral awareness of the chakra signatures within his range, even if he’s not directly looking for anything, but the latent haze of heavy, metallic chakra that clogs up the air like steam and toxic gas acts as a sandstorm to buffer and bewitch his senses.

Five minutes into the beginning of his tenure of a human sacrifice, and already he hates it.

The setting sun fixates its piercing, blood-red glare relentlessly on his sensitive eyes, and Tobirama can practically feel his retina burning up under the assault of solar radiation. Izuna, thankfully, doesn’t seem to notice his unending squinting, which is one of the few reliefs he has up here on the bare mountain slopes.

The vernal equinox marks one of two days of the year where the day and the night are of approximately the same length, and it also happens to be the time where the spirit and material worlds are most connected. The conjunction of night and day, of sun and moon, of human and supernatural are crucial elements to any ritual, but to the Uchiha’s wedding traditions, they are absolutely essential. 

Tobirama may only be married to Madara at the exact moment when the sun sets and the moon rises, for it is only then that their union will be well and truly harmonious; without the proper timing, Madara’s divine powers could easily overshadow Tobirama and his mere humanity, or perhaps Tobirama’s strong Suiton nature would drown out that of his new husband’s Katon. When the day meets the night, when the spirit world touches the material, when yōkai take shape amidst humanity and when chakra burns high and bright with the dissolution of the barriers that separate the natural from the supernatural – this is when their joining will be at its strongest, when god and mortal can be bound together for all eternity. 

He’s come to understand that it will be Madara’s choice to kill him or to keep him after they’re married, and he genuinely doesn’t know which option he’d prefer. One would have him die, but leave the mortal coil to go to the Pure Lands, to join his brothers and his mother in the afterlife, at peace and at rest. The other would let him live but trap him in a sham of a marriage with a kami he doesn’t know, doesn’t trust, _can’t_ trust and have him spend the rest of his life as – well, whatever Madara wants him to be, he supposes.

Tobirama and Izuna don’t speak as they hike up the path that leads to the temple, now within proper viewing distance with its multi-tiered pagoda roofing and enormous oversized eaves and various spiritual accoutrements dangling from fireproof shimenawa ropes, blowing in the blistering wind. He’s loathe to admit it, but Kagutsuchi is a work of architectural wonder; it’s no true complex like other temples, and much, _much_ bigger than the typical shrine, but it truly is a beautiful building, and Tobirama pauses to take in the sight of it as he approaches the basalt steps that wind up to its massive doors.

Its grandeur is not lost on him, but all he thinks of when he tips his head back to look at the tower in full is the phantom sensation of Madara in him, burning him up from the inside out and not noticing as Tobirama’s flesh blisters and boils beneath his touch. 

“Senju. I think you’re finally ready.”

Tobirama’s snapped out of his introspection by Izuna’s voice, and he looks up to see the man standing tall and proud by the doors of the temple, his face set into something cold and stony and his dark eyes glittering with hate. He gives Tobirama an inquisitive once-over, his glare burning through the silken layers of the kimono to peer into his very soul.

…No real change there, then, and the familiarity of Izuna’s anger is such a relief in the midst of all the rapid changes that Tobirama nearly sighs audibly in thanks. He’s not in a totally different world; not yet, at least.

“Am I?” Tobirama queries, just to be contrary. “It feels like I’ve been hung.” He rests his hands on the wide silver-white obi tied about his waist so tightly that his organs protest with every breath. 

The Dress is the most beautiful article of clothing that he’s ever seen. It’s a glorious silk hikifurisode, black and deep ocean blue like the inky midnight sky, almost entirely coated in fiery embroidery of headache-inducing intricacy. The red-gold threads shine like liquid flame in the light of the dying sun, tracing elaborate patterns along the length of the enormous, billowing sleeves and following the flowing pool of his long skirt.

The fact that it was made in the women’s style is not lost on him, and by the dirty smirk that Izuna sends his way when he has to hoist up the trailing edges of the sleeves so that they don’t drag in the ash and dust, the slight was intentional. He’s dressed more like a bride than anything else, even if he remains very definitely a man; maybe, he thinks with some amusement, Madara is straight, and they’re going to try and pass him off as a very masculine woman.

He chooses to be the better man and ignore the belligerent Uchiha as he approaches the basalt steps leading up into Kagutsuchi, careful to sweep up his skirts so that he doesn’t trip over them, and when Izuna throws open the temple doors with a dangerous irreverence, Tobirama finally sees _him._ A figure all in black and red, limned in golden light from the enormous blazing brazier that stands in front of him. 

Before him stands Madara, tall and imposing and different, somehow, than Tobirama had been expecting. In his human form they’re roughly the same height – Tobirama might even be taller – and although he’s a good deal bulkier and more muscular, he just looks like a _person._ Fancily dressed, maybe, with that elaborate-looking armor and the dark silken mantle, but—

Izuna pokes him in the side. “Don’t keep him waiting, Senju,” he hisses lowly under his breath. “It’s time.”

Tobirama’s sandals make no noise against the black rock floor as he approaches the fire god. The sophisticated, elegant sweep of his hikifurisode’s hem trails behind him with barely a whisper, and although his heart beats at an alarming pace with his panic, although he can barely walk straight, although his muscles feel like water under his skin, he makes it somehow. He arrives at Madara’s side without issue.

He’s so _warm,_ and when he shifts and turns to look over at Tobirama, he finds himself looking back, and what he sees is nothing less than breathtaking. 

The kami has the classic Uchiha facial structure with large, dark eyes, elegant high cheekbones, and full ~~kissable~~ lips, but the human familiarity stops there. His skin is slate gray, tinted coal-black in places where Tobirama would expect to see a blush on a normal person – is he _embarrassed?_ Can gods even feel embarrassment? – and his eyelashes are long and thick. They do not brush at his cheeks; he does not blink, staring back at him with unerring accuracy, expression utterly unreadable. His hair is enormous, wiry and wavy and blue-black like the feathers of a raven, and despite himself he wonders if it’s softer than it looks. It’s braided and tied back into an elaborate topknot secured with golden, ruby-encrusted kanzashi sticks, but his bangs still fall into his face.

It’s kind of cute, but the cuteness stops there. The kami is dressed in bright blood red and charcoal gray, wearing a thick, heavy mantle beneath plated ornamental armor so intricately decorated with gilding that it makes Tobirama’s head spin just to look at it. When he parts his lips ever-so-slightly to take a breath, feigning the need to breathe in the first place, he can see rows and rows and rows of blade-sharp teeth lining his mouth, and now that he knows to look for it, the line of his closed mouth is just barely warped by the presence of the fangs hidden behind it.

[ **You are to be my bride?** ] Madara asks, rows of razor-teeth flashing white in his mouth, and his voice echoes in his chest like a landslide; it’s everything Tobirama can do to keep his feet firmly planted on the ground and his body still and upright.

“I am your willing sacrifice, Tobirama of the Clan Senju, Uchiha-kami, and it is your prerogative to do with me what you will,” he recites dutifully, only barely ensuring that his throat doesn’t close around the sound of the words he’d really like to say, which are considerably less polite and respectful and more along the lines of _fuck off._  

The god purses his lips and narrows his eyes, activating his Sharingan and taking a step back so that he can scan Tobirama from head to toe. His chakra is indescribable. It can’t be more than a shred of Madara’s power, but the energy billows and burns high and fills Tobirama’s mind’s eye with such unbearably bright ecstasy that he thinks for a moment that he’s died. it feels like the sun, contained within the bulk of Madara’s humanoid form; there are no words that can be properly used to describe the sensation, because humans are not capable of inventing language that could do it any remote shred of justice. It feels like Mt. Shōja is erupting within his chakra coils, his body flooding high with something so raw and powerful and intense that it can only be his core chakra. It feels - it feels like - it feels like home. 

After Tobirama takes a moment to recover and Madara finishes with his scrutiny, Izuna clears his throat, and it’s only then that he remembers that the man exists at all.

“Are we _ready,_ Aniki?” he snaps, and oddly enough, Madara _blushes,_ face going from mid-toned gray to almost black in seconds, Sharingan eyes flickering back over to Tobirama’s form every other moment or so, rather less discreet than he probably thinks he’s being.

Tobirama is having the weirdest goddamn day. 

[ **It’s – satisfactory. You may commence with the ceremony.** ] 

Izuna nods, but not before he arches slim black eyebrows at the two of them and what admittedly odd sight they must make, standing before the igneous altar and just _staring_ at each other. 

He gets the impression that the two Uchiha know something he doesn’t, and he is decidedly less than fond of not knowing things. He’ll have to interrogate Izuna later about it if he ever gets the chance to see him again – likely, considering how he’d implied that he often climbs Mt. Shōja to pay personal tribute to his patron deity – or simply wait for Madara to clarify a few things, should he deign to speak to Tobirama once they’re married. 

They shuffle farther apart as Izuna walks up to the altar, taking a sake bottle and a sipping cup out of absolutely nowhere. There are no pine fronds – plant matter cannot survive the heat of Kagutsuchi, close to the volcano’s mouth as it is – but the alcohol seems to do just fine in the oppressive temperature. It doesn’t evaporate when Madara brings the cup up to his lips, only beginning to boil as he empties it, which Tobirama supposes is necessary. He’d look stupid just vacuuming the liquid into his mouth with a Fuuton jutsu.

Izuna pours the second portion as soon as the kami sets the cup back down on the altar, Tobirama’s first of three, and his hands resolutely do not shake as he reaches out for it. He _does_ almost drop the damn thing – it’s blisteringly hot where Madara had touched it, and he can’t quite repress a pained hiss as he clings tightly to the porcelain against his body’s instincts – but he has to survive, so he does. The alcohol doesn’t burn as it slides down his throat; he’s more than accustomed to sake, and it’s hardly the hottest, most intense thing he’s ever encountered.

No, Tobirama thinks dryly, watching Madara through his eyelashes as the god takes his second sip, that distinct honor belongs to something – some _one_ – else.

They finish drinking the sake as the tension thickens until it could be cut with a kunai, and Izuna begins the ritual prayer. His voice is low and smooth, and he doesn’t trip over the words as he says them, but Tobirama can’t really bring himself to pay attention to his little speech.

Madara is looking at him again, Sharingan irises framed by thick black eyelashes. It’s a strangely alluring combination, and he has to keep himself from leaning in to get more of that addicting heat and lovely, overwhelming chakra.

“…at this festival of love.  
This dance of light,

This sacred blessing,  
This divine love,  
beckons us  
to a world beyond  
only lovers can see  
with their eyes of fiery passion.

They are the chosen ones  
who have surrendered.  
Once they were particles of light  
now they are the radiant sun.

They have left behind  
the world of deceitful games.  
They are the privileged lovers  
who create a new world  
with their eyes of fiery passion…” 

Lots of passion and fire, but Tobirama supposes that he should have expected that. It is an Uchiha ceremony, after all.

“…and in the eyes of all the world, you are conjoined, bride and groom, husband and wife, god and mortal. May your union be a happy one.”

The words ring out in the suffocating silence of the temple. Madara is still staring at him.

Izuna starts glaring too, and it’s then that Tobirama remembers that it’s at this point in the ritual that they’re supposed to kiss, and he begins to lean forward. His gaze is drawn to Madara’s face like a magnet to a lodestone, and he can’t stop _looking_ at him, can’t rip his eyes away from those of the fire god.

The tomoe are spinning madly with excitement, a black blur in the bloody red sea of his irises, spinning, spinning, _changing,_ and he doesn’t have the time to look away before he can feel the heavy cloak of an extremely powerful genjutsu settling its hooks into his mind.

The last thing he hears before he collapses into the nether is Madara’s voice. [ ** _Tsukuyomi!_** ]


	8. beata maria (you know i am a righteous man)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one is SPICY fellas. dont worry madara will face consequences for being a Massive DoucheBag where Massive DoucheBaggery was absolutely NOt necessary!!! and there will be a happy ending. i should say that they are gonna fall in love. but first they have to fall out of love! there's drama ;-)

Hashirama hadn’t mentioned that his little brother had _red eyes._

“…adara, what the _fuck_ was _that_ for? I mean, I know he’s an asshole and all, but I thought you said you _liked_ him—”

Such _pretty_ eyes, too, like hellfire and lifeblood and Madara’s own Sharingan, deep crimson shot through with bright vermillion and vivid scarlet. Half-open and lined in long, snow-white eyelashes, glassy and unfocused from the hold of the genjutsu on his consciousness, he has the opportunity to appreciate just how beautiful his new husband is. Tobirama can’t make eye contact at the moment, can’t reciprocate Madara’s staring – the Tsukuyomi has him completely overwhelmed, and he’ll stay that way for the next forty-eight hours or so – but he’d been doing that before, during the ceremony, and the way he’d _looked_ at him, all smoldering irises and sharp, lovely chakra…

“—a fucking torture technique, you know! We – I don’t think the Senju bastard has ever had to experience the Tsukuyomi before, not even while we were at _war—”_

He hadn’t counted on it, but now that he considers those recent memories – Tobirama’s expression, the vast, oceanic pull of his chakra signature, the strong, slender perfection of his figure beneath the elaborate hikifurisode, the way the tension in his shoulders had eased ever so slightly when they’d first made eye contact, the way he was able to endure the sear of Madara’s touch without dropping the sake cup – and he realizes that it’s entirely possible that Tobirama wants him too. 

“—your _husband_ now, and you can’t just try to – I don’t even _know_ what the hell you think you were doing, actually, I can’t yell at you for that because there is literally _no reason—”_

Perhaps, then, his Tsukuyomi was unnecessary – it was not intended to be a means of hurting him, of punishing him, but a means of immersing him in Madara’s love and affection, a prelude of sorts to the wonderful life they’ll have together as a happily married couple – but even in that case, he finds he can’t regret it. Humans are such fickle creatures, after all, and this one is no Uchiha, with no inner flame to tie him to any one thing or person or concept; the sooner he gets it into his head that he is Madara’s, now, _only_ Madara’s, that Madara is the only thing that should matter to him anymore now that they’re married, the better it will be for the both of them. The genjutsu will teach his darling Senju everything the man needs to know to be perfectly content as his husband, and they can leave the difficulties of him being rejected by his brother and his Clan and everyone he’s known and loved so that he can be sacrificed as a war-bride to a foreign deity in the past, where such things belong. Madara simply won’t have his spouse ruminating on the circumstances that brought them together, and such things are irrelevant anyway – Tobirama’s old life is behind him, now, and there is no need for him to cling to what vestiges of the past that he might want to.

“—will you just _admit_ that you’ve ruined everything? When the Senju wakes up – _if_ he wakes up at all – he’s going to be so righteously furious with you for trying to Sharingan your way around his defenses that he’d rather throw himself into the volcano than live with you, much less endure a _marriage_ to you.”

Izuna’s words finally register in his mind as something other than ambient noise floating in through one ear and out the other, and despite the good mood he should be curating – he’s been wedded to such a gorgeous, extraordinary creature! – he finds himself drawn towards rage. [ ** _What_** **did you say?** ] 

Izuna scowls down at him and where he sits on the temple floor, cradling his new husband in his lap, carding his fingers through that lovely white hair. “Oh, you’ve decided to descend back to the world of the mortals now, have you, O Great One? I _said_ that he’s going to be so fucking _pissed_ at you for putting him in the _Tsukuyomi_ for _no reason_ that he’d rather kill himself than force himself through a life by your side. I wouldn’t blame him if he refused to even look at you for the rest of his days.”

Madara’s hands tighten around Tobirama’s, and he doesn’t notice the way his clawed fingers rake across soft white skin to carve shallow cuts into the flesh of his palms, doesn’t notice the way the sapphire stud earrings glow and whine under the pressure of keeping Tobirama safe from the sudden spike of his body temperature, doesn’t notice those pretty white eyebrows crease in discomfort. 

He’s a little busy being absolutely _apoplectic._

Tobirama can’t hear him. His mind won’t process any outside stimuli so long as he sleeps under the genjutsu’s influence, so he feels no shame about gently setting the man down on the floor, brushing ash and dust off of the silk of his dress, and then standing up, turning to his little brother, and losing his cool. 

Izuna flinches back and away from the searing heat of his temper, sweat beading on his brow and mouth twisted into a grimace at the blast of unwelcome heat, but Madara is already occupied with ripping into him for his _gall._  

[ **You,** ] he snarls, the sound of his voice echoing around the interior of Kagutsuchi, so much louder than he’d intended it to be, [ **you _dare_ stand in my temple and question my judgement and _slander_ my relationship? You _dare_ say that I will be anything less than stellar as a caretaker for my husband? You _dare—_** ]

“Oh, I dare,” the human snaps, _interrupting him,_ stretching himself up to his full height and meeting Madara’s eyes without regret. “I _dare,_ and I’m not even wrong when I say that Tobirama might have been better off with the Senju than he is with you, if this is how you’re going to treat him—” 

Madara cuts him off with a wordless roar, lunging at him with outstretched talons, faster than the blink of an eye, too fast for Izuna to dodge. The sizzling snap of his fingers closing around the man’s neck is so _satisfying,_ but more so is lifting him up off the basalt floor and wringing him around like a lifeless doll, insolent brat that he is. 

[ **You will _leave,_** ] he growls, voice warped almost incomprehensibly by his fury. [ **You will _leave_ this place and you _will not return._ You will never insult my husband again by polluting his reputation with your poisonous thoughts. You will go home to your Clan and the Senju and you will _explain_ to them exactly _why_ I am withdrawing my endorsement of their peace, and you will look Hashirama in the eyes and suffer his wrath and his grief. You will resign as Clan Head and have the elders appoint someone who understands the concept of _respect_ and _duty,_ and you will scrape the ground and bow and _grovel_ in your gratitude of my generosity. I won’t smite you, Uchiha Izuna, not now, not here – I don’t want to sully the home I am to share with Tobirama by ending your miserable life within its walls – but should you defy me _one more time,_ my mercy will know its end, as you will know yours.**] 

Izuna’s Sharingan are teary and bloodshot, either from the smoke or the way Madara is choking him or the impact of his words, and he claws uselessly at the iron grip of his black-tipped fingers. Madara is a _god,_ after all, and this stripling is only human; he is helpless to argue, to protest, helpless in the face of his anger, helpless to resist his strength.

His fingers tighten around Izuna’s neck until he can feel his spine and esophagus grinding against each other, until the blue-faced gasps stop entirely, until his eyes roll back into his head and the useless writhing of his body ceases altogether.

He’s not dead – only unconscious – and Madara is _gracious_ enough that he will allow the man to keep his eyes, eyes modeled after _Madara’s_ divine glory, but the mere sight of him is sickening.

He releases his grip, and Izuna collapses to the floor, utterly insensate, his boneless posture bearing an eerie resemblance to Tobirama, laying just a few meters to the right.

_I wouldn’t blame him if he refused to even look at you for the rest of his days._

…Izuna can’t be right. He just _can’t_ be. Everything Madara does, he does out of the goodness of his heart, with pure intentions and no malice whatsoever, especially not for his beloved husband. He just doesn’t understand; he isn’t _hurting_ Tobirama, he’s simply showing him how much he’s loved. He won’t be angry with Madara when he wakes from the Tsukuyomi; he won’t ever _want_ to be angry at Madara, not when he knows how much he wants him, not when he knows how treasured and desired and coveted he is by none other than a _god._ It’s plenty obvious to Madara that Tobirama had never known such love in the Senju compound, and he never would have had the chance to form those kinds of bonds in the duration of his short time with the Uchiha. Whatever Hashirama’s words on how he held his little brother as his most precious person, the man’s soul has been neglected and malnourished to the point where it’s begun to _wither._ Madara can fix it – of course he can – but it will take time and love and close attention for him to overcome the hardships of the recent weeks.

It makes sense, in a way, that Izuna can’t understand. There’s no one who loves him in the way that Madara loves Tobirama, in the way that Tobirama will soon come to love Madara. He couldn’t possibly hope to fathom his aniki’s reasoning, and it means that he can’t see that he’s _right._

Madara is _right._

There is simply no other option. 

With a sigh, he gets up and deposits Izuna on the steps of Kagutsuchi before he goes back inside, scoops up his Tobirama, and carries him back to their marriage bed. His body is lax and unresisting as Madara tucks him into the comforter, embroidered seals glowing red-gold with fireproofing chakra, and it’s no difficult matter for him to position them so that his husband is tucked safely into his hold, Madara’s arms crushing their forms together until no space remains between the two of them. 

As a god, he doesn’t sleep, but that’s alright. Tobirama’s human needs are charming, and he’ll indulge them as is required of him as a dutiful, loving spouse.

It does not occur to him that half of the Tsukuyomi’s victims are permanently trapped inside their own minds, effectively comatose, locked up in the genjutsu with no way of escaping. It does not occur to him that there is such a thing as _too much_ care. 

He watches his husband sleep, tracing the intricate red lines of his tattoos, and it does not occur to him that Izuna might have been correct.

It does not occur to him that Tobirama may never wake at all.

**Author's Note:**

> gonna try and update this every other wednesday


End file.
